Thomas Hooker was a Puritan minister who became lecturer at St Mary’s, Chelmsford (now the Cathedral) in 1626. His Puritan views attracted the attention and displeasure of Archbishop Laud and he was eventually forced to leave Chelmsford. He was invited by ‘some eminent persons’ to open a school in Little Baddow (at Cuckoos Farm) with John Eliot as his assistant. Little Baddow’s residents had strong Puritan leanings, probably following the lead of Sir Henry Mildmay of Graces and the Barrington family of Tofts.
Thomas Hooker was eventually forced to flee England, and after a brief stay in Holland he embarked for Boston, Massachusetts to join a group of his Essex followers known as ‘Mr Hooker’s Company’. They eventually moved to the Connecticut valley to a riverside site which became known as Hartford. Thomas Hooker was instrumental in drafting the “Fundamental Orders” – a democratic governmental plan that was eventually adopted into the American Constitution.
John Eliot had also taken ship for New England, settling at Roxbury near Boston and becoming pastor and teacher there – a ministry which lasted 60 years. He began ministering to the Indians in 1646, publishing an Indian translation of the Bible – the first Bible to be printed in America.
In the 1980s Deryck Collingwood, then Minister of the Chapel discovered Little Baddow’s links to Hooker and Eliot and the founding of these communities in northern America. Contact was established with the churches of Hartford and Roxbury and since then there has been a regular exchange of visits and correspondence.
Each year in July an open-air service is held at Cuckoos to commemorate these links. Deryck Collingwood left his research archive to the village and work has begun to index it.
Our “Hooker and Eliot” exhibition is available to view by prior arrangement. Please contact us for further information.